Monthly Archives: June 2018

Arriving in Brighton the following week, Rochelle wondered if history would continue to repeat itself. Like the weeks before, she made her delivery and began to eat her lunch from her usual vantage pointto see if things would happen as before. At first, it looked quite possible. The gang of youths were still loitering about the area unchallenged. At times she could overhear some of the foul language coming from their direction. However, after twenty minutes of observing and finishing her lunch, there was no sign of the vulnerable young man. Satisfied nothing was going to happen, she got up to leave although a thought occurred to her that it was a shame that the young man wasnot able to come around on account of these hooligans.

With her lunch break nearly over and content that she might have stopped this gang from harassing the weak, she got up to go. As she was doing so, something suddenly caught her eye. She spied an elderly couple walking towards the gang. A few seconds later, while she watched, her instincts provedto be right. The alpha-male and several others with him approached them. From where she stood, it seemed from the way the alpha-male was jumping up and down, they were being as aggressive to this harmless old couple as they had been to the vulnerable young man. Her first thought was to ring the police again but by now, she knew that would be pointless. Therefore, she decided to take matters upon herself.

Even before she had reached that decision in her mind,she was halfway across the roadand like a shot was over to confront the gang. Before she even got there, she could hearthe alpha-male bellowing, “You might have fought in the war but you still have to pay our toll to go past!” The fact that the elderly man was trying to stand his ground impressed her. After all, seventy-five years earlier, he had done the same against the Germans. However, his wife was advising him to hand over some money and not create a fuss. This couple neededsaving!

Full of anger and determination, Rochelle stepped in between the couple and the alpha-male, slightly surprised and relieved that no one in the gang tried to confront her. Concluding she had the element of surprise, she balked, “Why don’t youleave these people alone!”

“What’s it to you? Bitch!” the alpha-male snapped. “You better walk away now or we’re going to fuck you up.”

Pushing aside her bemusement that this young man had seen too many films or television shows, she immediately squared up to him, sizing up her opponent in the process. She could now see that he was Five feet ten, three inches taller than she wasand looked about seventeen or eighteen. His loose fitting clothes hid his true physique but that did notmatter much to her. Rochelle had taken down larger opponents.

“What, you need a gang? You can’t take one woman on your own?” she chided in retort.

Her question was answered with a chorus of “Ooooh’s” from the gang with one male in the crowd stating, “I think she wants to fight you.”

Shrugging off the last comment while reaching into his pocket, the alpha male suddenly produced a shiny silver object and growled, “I’ll fucking stanley you!”

“What? Now you need to use a knife on me,” Rochelle answered back while taking a fighting stance in case he used the blade.

A female voice then rang out, “Just thump her one, she won’t be so brave then.”

Emboldened by his cheering section, the alpha male put his blade back in his pocket, then suddenly lashed out with a wild right. Seeing it coming all the way, Rochelle easily blocked it. More ‘oooh’s’ from the crowd encouraged him to strike out with his left but his target side-stepped causing him to miss badly. Seizing her chance, just like she had done with Amazon Glenda, Rochelle stepped in and hit pay dirt with a right to the young man’s temple and like her previous opponent, he too fell to the ground not to get up again.

Seeing their champion flat on his back, unconscious, indecision now gripped the gang. One boy proclaimed, “Fucking hell, she knocked him out!” Some thought they should avenge their fallen comrade while others sought to flee. Seeing Rochelle in a fighting stance, bouncing on the balls ofher feet and looking full of adrenaline, from her quick victory, the gang chose the latter option and hastily withdrew leaving their defeated friend behind. However, once at a safe distance, a girl from the group shouted to Rochelle, “We’ll get you, you fucking bitch!”

The elderly couple could not thank Rochelle enough for her heroic actions but they were just as serious in advising her to leave as soon as possible. She did so but only after she was fully assured the couple were now going to be safe.

In the week between trips to Brighton, something in her mind told Rochelle to store the information she had written down on her mobile phone. She had the feeling she might need it when she went back there the following week. Sure enough, she was glad she had because when she finished the delivery, the same gang was across the road. The loud swearing by some of them emphasising their presence.

Right on cue, the vulnerable young man came along. However, this time he was accompanied by another young man. Rochelle hoped that this other man would be a carer. However, as she watched the events unfold, it was evident that the other young man was just as vulnerable as the first one.

She watched as two of the boys in the gang began shoving the newcomer back and forth. Meanwhile, the alpha male approached the original victim with a menacing stance. It looked to Rochelle that the aggressor might actually punch his vulnerable target. Without further confrontation, the vulnerable young manfollowed protocol and reached into his pocket to give the alpha male his leave me alone fee. However, handing over the protection money did notcompletely free the pair from further torment. As they tried to leave, they were forced to endure more shoves and what sounded like some unsavoury comments from the gang. Before the victims were ten feet past where their ordeal had taken place, Rochelle’s mobile was out and she was speed dialling the number the police had given her the previous week.

“Police, help line,” a male voice this time responded.

“Yes,” Rochelle began, fighting to quell her building anxiety. “Last week, I reported a group of youths by the sea front harassing and exploiting a vulnerable young man. Well, it just happened again but this time there were two victims.”

“You say this happened at the sea front, just now?” the voice probed.

“Yes.”

“About how many youths were involved would you say?”

“I’d say about fifteen.”

“When you say there were harassing these two people, what do you mean exactly?”

“These kids shout, push, hit, kick and threatened these two young men who can’t defend themselves. Then they got them to hand over money so they could be left alone.”

“Okay” was the only response. Then the voiceadded, “We’ll send a car to the area to see what is happening.” After the phone conversation ended, Rochelle hung around to see if a police car would turn up, none did. After an hour, Rochelle realised she needed to go to her next delivery so she left. She had given up hope that any police would come.

Memories begin to fade over time but it was not long enough for Rochelle’s memory of the incidentin Brighton. It was still in the forefront of her mind when she returned to the city to make her delivery the following week. She was hoping that what happened the previous week was a one-off but after shehadmade her delivery, she looked across the road andsure enough, the same gang of kids were hanging around. A few minutes later, she spied the same vulnerable young man from the previous week making his way towards the group. She continued to observe, curious to see what would happen next.

Almost immediately, a girl from the group went over to the young man, waving her hands in front of his face, making out she was going to slap him. Instinctively, the victim stepped back but the tormenting female stepped nearer, continuing her taunt. Her hands got too close to him so the young man pushed them away.

“He slapped my hand!” the young girl squealed.

Needing no further self-justification, the alpha male leader came to the girl’s rescue. He gave the young man a forceful shove, nearly causing him to lose his balance. “So, you like slapping girls!” the alpha male bellowed. He gave another shove and this time his target fell back onto his bottom. Rochelle couldnot make out what was being said by the alpha male who was standing over the young man while he tried to get back on his feet but she could tell that it was intimidating and the vulnerable man looked frightened. Once he managed toget to his feet, the victim reached into his pocket and handed something over to the aggressor. Obviously money in Rochelle’s mind. It was only after that the young man was allowed to pass but not before the girl who had instigated it all gave one last kick up the bottom.

In Rochelle’s mind, this was too much. Incensed, she pulled out her mobile phone and immediately dialed999 and asked to speak to the police.

“Brighton Police, what is your emergency,” inquired a female voice on the end of the line.

“I have just witnessed a group of youths intimidate and rob a vulnerable young man,” Rochelle reported, her combined anger and eagerness to the right thing making her huff and puff between words.

“Where did this happen?”

“On the sea front, across the road from Fish n Pie’s Chip Shop.”

“And how long ago did the incident occur?”

“Literally, just a minute ago.”

The voice on the other end of the line pressed for more details, such as numbers and descriptions which Rochelle provided with a fair amount of confidence. When she concluded her report, the voice assured her that the matter would be looked into. Rochelle briefly had to scramble for a pen and paper so she could take down the phone number given to her in the event that she could provide more information. When it was all over, Rochelle hoped that it would be dealt with, at least for the young man’s sake.

It was because she was still virtually unknown in professional MMA, Rochelle still had torely on her day job delivering supplies to fish and chip shops up and down the east coast of England from her home town of Skegness. However, she did like her job a lot, especially on a Wednesday because it involved a lot of driving making deliveries to Clacton-on-Sea and Brighton. That gave her time to reflect back on her last fight and begin mentally preparing for the next while all the time, taking in the views of the sea.

The coastal drive had taken the entire morning, so she was glad for the break after the shop in Brighton took delivery. That shop happened to be right on the sea front, so she took her sandwiches and bought a bottle of orange juiceand went to go sit in the sand to enjoy her lunch and the view. Her plan was briefly disrupted when she heard the shop owner remark, “I wish those feral delinquents wouldn’t come around here.”

She looked in the direction the owner was indicating. Across the road, near the beach,about ten to fifteen youths, all looking between the ages of 16-20, were standing about. Everything about them confirmed the owner’s label of the group in her mind. She thought, “What a bunch of chavs!” Half of them were in hoodies despite the warmer weather andmost of them were smoking. The coarse languagecould be clearly heard even from where Rochelle was standing. Suddenly, the gang’s attention turned to one young man who happened to be walking past them. This young man was around the same age as the group, possibly a few years older. Right away, she could see that he was vulnerable, probably having special needs.

Four of the group quickly surrounded the young man while the rest took positions where they could best view the upcoming spectacle. One lad, wearing a New York Knicks basketball top and three-quarter length trousers assumed the role ofleader. While Rochelle could not quite make out everything that was being said, it was obvious he was being threatening to his victim. The self-proclaimed leader was now in the young, vulnerable man’s face. After several shoves from him and some of his cohorts, the young man handed something over to his chief tormentor, obviously money in Rochelle’s mind. After the leader accepted the tribute, the young man was allowed to pass but not before one of the girls in the group kicked him in the bottom, bringing loud laughter to the rest of the group.

She had to use every ounce of her resolve in order to prevent herself from going over to the gang and slapping everyone of them senseless. What they had just done was wrong but she knew that if she had confronted the gang, her MMA skills would nothave helped her against such numbers. At the same time, she wanted to go comfort the victim but he had quickly disappeared. Instead, she went back to her original plan of eating her lunch on the beach before making the drive home. However, she could notget the incident she had witnessed out of her mind.

I am finally going to jump on the band wagon here. Many of the blogs I follow put their stories on their blogs for all to see, so I am going to put my latest short story here. It is part of the latest novel I am working on called “The V- Network” which starts with several stories about people being let down by the criminal justice system who go on to form a vigilante group. Have a read and be as nice or as vicious as you like with the feed back.

No wonder she’s called ‘Amazon Glenda,’ Rochelle thought to herself as she struggled to break free of her opponent’s grasp. Glenda’s strong legs were securely wrapped around Rochelle’s head. Rochelle was finding it increasingly more difficult to breathe but there was no way she was going to succumb. With all her strength, she managed to get onto her side and then somehow, get up on her knees but it in no way lessened the pressure now being applied on her head. The move gave her some breathing space but still, her energy was slowly being sapped away.

The loud ding of the bell ended her ordeal and round one of the fight. Glenda was forced to release her head scissors and both combatants went to their respective corners of the octagon cage.

“You were very fortunate the bell rang, otherwise she might have gotten you to submit,” her manager informed her,scoldingly.

“Yeah, I know,”Rochelle affirmed as she spit out a mouthful of water into a bucket next to her.

“Then you know to stay out of her grasp then. You’re strength is in your boxing ability, use that.”

Rochelle nodded as the words of advice echoed through her mind as she went out for round four. Immediately, Glenda charged at her but Rochelle side stepped and landed a round-house kick thatcaught her opponent in the mid-section. The blow had its desired effect. It enabled Rochelle to step inside the reach of the six foot two amazon who was six inches taller and land a left jab on the amazon’s chin. Glenda swung wildly but Rochelle parried that easily. Stepping in closer, she used all of her strength to land a right square onto her opponent’s jaw. Glenda crumpled to the mat in a huge heap.

The fallen gladiator made no movement while the referee counted to ten. Rochelle did her best to hide her exhilaration whenthe ref announced, “You’re out!” She raised her arms and let out a shrill scream in celebration of her latest victory.

Ring staff had only just managed to get the defeated Glenda to sit up as the ring announcer was proclaiming, “In thirty-eight seconds of the fourth round, the winner by knockout, Rocket Rochelle Dibley!” As the referee raised her right hand, she threw up her left, all the while, soaking up the applause of the crowd.

Memories of her latest victory was still fresh in Rochelle’s mind as she drove her delivery van into Brighton the following week. She was now undefeated in seven fights and her latest victory was her biggest yet. Amazon Glenda had been unbeaten in eight fights before meeting Rochelle. The MMA world had to take her seriously now.

HI, I have tried to re-blog a marvelous post I read about metal illness and suicide but stupid WordPress didn’t give me the option as to which of my sites I wanted it posted to. It went straight to my 80smetalman’s Blog which is a music blog. If you want to read it and I recommend you do, go to http://www.80smetalman.wordpress.com

Reflecting on last week’s post, “You Don’t Have Asperger’s Syndrome,” I realized I didn’t include the most obvious one. I say the most because I’ve heard it used over and over again, especially on me. That is, “You don’t look like a person with Asperger’s Syndrome.”

Really? I didn’t know that a person with Asperger’s Syndrome or any kind of Autism or mental illness was supposed to have a certain look. Someone please tell me, what is a person with Asperger’s Syndrome supposed to look like? I haven’t a clue.

Before I go into my own experiences let me introduce another example. We’ll call him Earl for this example. Earl has Asperger’s Syndrome but if you were to look at him, you wouldn’t think so. In fact, some new members of staff actually thought he was another member of staff when they first met him. That is at least until he produces his several bags containing Star Wars figures. Then it becomes clear why he is a resident of the home and not a member of staff. Because like so many of the residents I support, if Early had his way, he would spend all of his money on Star Wars and other film action figures and nothing else. Furthermore, there have been instances where staff have had to come in and save him from getting a beating because he had said something inappropriate to their girl friends. This is because he isn’t aware of many social norms and what is an isn’t appropriate to say to women. So, while Earl certainly doesn’t look like he has Asperger’s Syndrome, he does.

I too have had people saying that I don’t look like someone with Asperger’s Syndrome. That’s because they only know me from modern times and hadn’t seen me when I was younger. When I was twelve, I remember somebody asking another person who knew me, “Is he as uncoordinated as he looks?” So, there must have been something there. Then again, it seems for many years that I had “VICTIM” stamped across my forehead and was often the target of bullies. Therefore, I must conclude that back in my youth, I might have looked like someone who had some sort of metal illness. Asperger’s wasn’t a thing back then.

Nowadays, after many years of experience and often painful trial and error, I have learned how to survive in the “normal” world. I avoid things that might get me singled out as not normal or worse, make people think I’m an easy victim. I don’t look like someone who doesn’t have Asperger’s Syndrome but I am convinced I do have the condition. Sometimes, those little ‘ticks’ of mine do manifest themselves. Especially when there’s a lot on my mind and I’m trying to process it and my lips are saying what I’m thinking. Yes, I talk to myself, deal with it!

So, what does someone with Asperger’s syndrome look like? Well, they could look like me or Earl or any of a number of other people. There is no obvious look to the condition because often times, most mental illnesses aren’t visible.

For an account of my early life, read my book, “He Was Weird.” You can get it here:

Through the five years I’ve been writing this blog and reading the blogs of others on related topics, the more I am convinced that I have Asperger’s Syndrome and DAMP. However, there are probably many who have known me in the years before and while the great majority of them would immediately point out that there is something wrong with me, they would be the first to shoot down my claim that I have Asperger’s. Of course, some of these people were bullies or simply wanted to control me and would only say that it’s not Asperger’s because they didn’t choose my affliction. What I am going to do now is to bring up the arguments I imagine would be used to counter my belief that I have the condition.

You’re just weird: Nobody is just weird. Many people have metal illnesses which cause them to be perceived as such. The fact that I appear weird to you only proves that I have some sort of mental condition, most probably Asperger’s.

Everyone is saying that they have Asperger’s these days: True, more and more people are being diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome and this is a good thing. No one is saying it to be cool or trendy but they simply realize that they may have it. Just because more people are saying they have something doesn’t mean that the majority of them are lying about it.

You just want to make excuses for yourself: Yes, I have had a lot of failure in my life and many successes. As I think back on the failures, sometimes it was down to my Asperger’s and DAMP and the way they affect my mind. I don’t need to make excuses but what I do need is for people to understand that I may do something that might seem not normal to you but logical to me. The other point is that I avoid many social situations that seem foreign to me because it does send my anxiety levels sky high. I now know why I have made many gaffes in these situations and my Asperger’s is a fact, not an excuse!

You’re proud of it: Uh, I doubt that anyone with Asperger’s Syndrome is proud of the fact they have it. Most Aspies I know hate that they have this condition. I am not proud of the fact that I have Asperger’s Syndrome and wish it would just go away.

You want everyone to feel sorry for you: Nobody has felt sorry for me before I found I have Asperger’s Syndrome nor do I expect anyone to feel sorry for me now. Persons with Asperger’s don’t want pity, they just want understanding and acceptance.

You want to play the victim: Having been bullied in my childhood because I had undetected Asperger’s Syndrome does tend to make me see myself as a victim. Therefore, I don’t need to play what I was. Many Asperger’s sufferers are easy victims because their condition makes them easy targets.

One from conservative Americans (Republicans mainly)- You’re hoping to get lots of money from the government and live off my taxes: No I don’t! I have a good job, actually three jobs so I am quite capable of supporting myself and family without help from the government. However, there are many people with Asperger’s who are not able to do so without support. These people aren’t welfare cheats, just ones in need of assistance. I even bring this argument into the story in “He Was Weird.”

There are probably many more of these out there and I would love to hear contributions from others. These are the ones I fear would be put my way from those who refuse to believe or accept that I have Asperger’s Syndrome.

To buy He Was Weird, go to: https://www.amazon.co.uk/He-Was-Weird-Michael-Lefevre/dp/1909740942/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1528311903&sr=1-1&keywords=he+was+weird